This month, a Chinese medical student who aspires to become a researcher, wrote from the heart about the need to balance academic excellence with sound mental health. In the essay, Yifan Yu referenced personal frustration at being unable to gain high scores in tests at school, while knowing instinctively that individuals are not defined by marks assigned on an exam paper.
The article, “Academic success: don’t forget our mental health”, appears in several publications in the west. It refers to a number of programmes in China, which do not employ today’s universally joyless results-driven models, and are available to university students. It notes too that there is much more focus now on the mental health of children and adolescents with psychological counselling centres and hotlines being established in Chinese schools.
While the incidents are reportedly much rarer than in other countries, violence in schools does exist in China. Pertaining to savagery from the outside entering schools, the most recent was an armed (knife) attack by a man at a kindergarten in July this year that resulted in six deaths. Prior to that in August last year, three people were killed and six wounded in a primary school stabbing. Meanwhile, in January 2019, a man wielding a hammer had entered a primary school and injured 20 children. However, what has been prevalent in Chinese schools and continues to a large extent is bullying by and among peers in schools, resulting in at least one death in 2021.
The current mental health interventions mentioned could very well be linked to both the violence and the bullying, along with academic stressors; the essay did not specify. What is important though is that they exist and are accessible, considering the tumultuous effect trauma has on children and youth.
A vast number of studies have found that untreated trauma in children can lead to anxiety, aggression, depression, learning issues, psychiatric disorders, panic attacks, and a tendency for substance abuse. In the long term, such children are more likely to become dysfunctional adults and may also develop chronic non-communicable diseases.
The gamut of what traumatises children runs from neglect to psychological, physical and sexual abuse, including domestic violence whether witnessed or experienced; from being shamed by teachers and other adults, to bullying and school violence – again both witnessed and experienced. Children can also be traumatised by the death of a parent or other loved one; a global pandemic (Covid-19); fires that destroy or threaten their homes or schools, and even natural disasters. This list is by no means exhaustive. The current generation of children aged four to 19 years old has probably been subject to more traumatic events than any other in the past. If trends continue, this will also be true of the next generation and so on.
With the cause and effect so well known, the question of why childhood trauma is not being treated holistically everywhere remains a conundrum. Maybe not. Many of the armchair experts in Guyana will be quick to scoff at “babying” children, while proudly recounting how their experiences with “discipline” made them who they are. In fact, what they have become is worthy of any empathy one can dredge up.
On Friday last, schools closed for the Christmas holidays. Some children, sadly not all, have begun to enjoy a well-deserved break. Others will be attending lessons maybe right up to Christmas Eve. With major exams looming months into the new year and the pressure to excel, placed on them by their parents or themselves, joy is on the backburner. Undoubtedly, there are students who are relieved not to be at school where, apart from the humdrum approach to learning that they might find boring and unintelligible, they constantly have to worry about being ridiculed, taken advantage of or subjected to violence. Neglecting to recognise and address that fear in our children is just one way in which we continually fail them.
As vicious acts in our schools continue to increase, it is worth noting here that the Ministry of Education’s anti-violence policy announced last month as being piloted in a single secondary school does not imbue any parent with confidence. But then neither did the 2020 ‘Violence, Injury and Indiscipline Prevention Initiative’, the 2011 ‘Promoting a Culture of Security and Safety in Schools’ strategy nor the numerous others of similar ilk that have appeared and disappeared over the years.
Punishing students who perpetrate cruelty without getting to the root of it only serves to perpetuate the problem. There is a word for continuing to do the same thing and expecting a different result. The authorities overseeing the nation’s education should look it up. The time is ripe for a fresh approach. One way would be to employ trained counsellors in schools and have them interact with children regularly instead of just when issues arise. We owe the future that much.